Thursday, February 2, 2012

Public education looms large on the minds of south suburban residents who have created the South Mecklenburg Alliance of Responsible Taxpayers, or SMART (you can find it on Facebook). The group organized last month with about 35 people, and they'll be following up next week with talk about education in general and the new alliance between Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and Project LIFT in particular.

At least a handful of north suburbanites are watching closely and attending meetings as well.

For those who have been around awhile, this evokes echoes of the 2005 "secession" movement that drew hundreds of people to talk about splitting CMS into smaller districts. The movement eventually fizzled, defused in part by the 2006 hiring of Superintendent Peter Gorman, who promised to make the district more responsive and less Charlotte-centric.

Fast forward seven years: CMS is looking for a successor to Gorman. There's a new board majority that riled some suburban folks by appointing a little-known Democrat, Amelia Stinson-Wesley, to a vacant seat representing the Republican-leaning District 6. Bill James, who represents that southern district as a county commissioner, grabbed a lot of interest with a recent email suggesting the Ballantyne area should split off as its own town.

Where is all this heading? For those who want to find out, there are a couple of opportunities next week. On Monday, Matthews Mayor Jim Taylor and Mint Hill Mayor Ted Biggers have invited residents of those towns to meet Stinson-Wesley at the Matthews Town Hall, 232 Matthews Station St., from 6:30 to 8 p.m.

And SMART meets from 6:30 to 8 Tuesday at Raintree Country Club Clubhouse, 8600 Raintree Lane.

A split from the city would be highly unlikely and not that feasable. But splitting CMS into 3 districts would be a very possible and wise move. I bet a lot of people would be more inclined to move to, or stay in, Mecklenburg County if they didn't have to be be a part of CMS.

This dynamic highlights the issue of class playing out in public education today. The super elites are pouring millions into high poverty schools in an attempt to find a formula for a successful racially and economically segregated school system. The middle class families are looking at the all really wonderful wrap around services and strategic staff being provided in the public school context and question the fairness. In fact, many middle class kids have issues and would benefit from these services as well. This is what happens when you try to "ration" quality education. The system will eventually implode. Why don't we acknowledge that segrated public school systems don't work?

I'm all for it. I'm sick and tired of seeing the majority of my property tax dollars I spend on an expensive home in Ballantyne go to schools my kids won't attend. The disparity in spending per pupil across the board in CMS is disgusting.

CMS is too big. Plain and simple. However I don't think the history and politics of Charlotte will ever allow the school system to be broken up. Are there any other county-wide school systems in the US that have successfully divided into smaller districts?

Also, private schools and charter schools are fully embeded in Charlotte's educational landscape. Assuming this crowd returned to smaller CMS districts there wouldnt be enough money in any district to support the influx. The whole system would go bankrupt. Private schools help support CMS's current per-pupil spending.

CMS has never been able to design a consistent student assignment plan. I think some folks in the suburbs need to start laying off the weed if they think CMS will ever be capable of dividing into smaller districts. Prepare for Armageddon.

CMS is what it is. The best it will ever be able to do is win an award for urban-blight education. CMS will never be able to compete head-to-head with smaller suburban school districts located in areas similar to Ballantyne. Don't like it? Send you kids to private school or move back up to Connecticut and be prepared to move into a smaller house without a golf course view while paying triple in local school taxes.

12:00--CMS can hardly be described as "segregated" (unless you are a die-hard Swann member or perhaps one of the aging limousine liberals who fondly remember busing days through rose colored glasses). And speaking of busing, could you please explain to us how well that system worked --you know, back when we shifted kids all over town but still had a huge achievement gap that nobody mentioned.

Back when, Gorman created the area school zones and appointed an Area Superintendent for each, this was an attempt to create something like smaller districts - obviously it didn't go near far enough in scope.

The concept though is one worth revisiting, or rather revising. It'll definitely be difficult to carve out a separate district in South Mecklenburg, but what if those area zones were given more control?

It would be interesting for this parent group to devise a strategy for allowing their zone to ramp up autonomy and present that to the Board. I'd think if a group came in with a detailed, air-tight plan they'd get much more consideration over an airing of grievances.

And present the plan as an experiment: we want to try X over 2 school years with Y and Z expected results.

I'd think a plan of action would be more effective than another advocacy group trying to make its voice be heard.

February 2, 2012 12:00 PM .. segragated school systems do work - for those students that want to learn. Da'Shaun can't learn by osmosis if he sits next to a smart white kid. As a matter of fact, Da'Shaun actually drags down all the smart kids in the class, black or white, by dumbing down the class to meet his level of effort. Granted, not all children are smart, so there has to be seperation. 40 years of trying have produced the same thing - poor results due to poor efforts on behalf of the parents and children who don't care. It starts in the home.

The concept of breaking it into 4 spokes out from Charlotte sounds good. It would lessen the "segregation" issue and we could do have one less big bureaucrat (we have are superintendents and therefore would not need to replace Gorman).

Those with history from last time will be able to tell of the political problems with breaking up CMS. However the fight will be stiffer now because the Chamber has been embarrassed by the CMS closing of under-performing and high cost schools. CMS tried to lay a sacrifice out there with Davidson IB but that has been ignored. We will not see what the Chamber is doing behind the scenes till the final vote on the CMS budget by the BOE and by the BOCC to see how they will have amendments proposed and slipped through.

I imagine they will somehow slide even more money into the urban schools. And slight the suburban schools even more. BOCC is doing it agreesively by refusing to build more capacity where it is needed by their new evaluation tool that ignors overcrowding.

The one play suburbanites might have is with the Republican controlled legislature. They are very aware of the failure of these money handout programs that have failed to deliver any academic improvements for this demographic. Without any resolution from local governments or courts, they might be willing to introduce legislation and lay that threat out there to force local government bodies to compromise.

2:28 PM, what you speak of is the "infection" urban students have caused and simply stopped any discipline in public schools. Young people will push and push the limits and when authority does not deal with it, you simply get the case of the inmates running the asylum.

2:16 PM, that was the premise behind the 4 school choice zones created after the last court case. The zones were racially balanced and included good schools and bad schools. In each zone, you could choose to be bused to any school in the zone. The problem they had however was the lack of seats in the good schools due to unwillingness of the BOE's back then to build schools where the students were for example Waddell HS and Winding Springs ES. These were "midpoint" schools where the 2 races would be bused to them with little local population to fill them.

The reason the schools perform so well is because of the parents involvement in the schools. And so many parents spend extra money on tutoring outside of those schools to help their child learn, because it is near impossible for some students to be effectively taught in an elementary classroom with 30 students.

This will happen easily as all you have to do is show the BOE and CMS a pile of money under their noses. Just like LIFT it would be spent on white kids in the burbs with white vendors by whites. (fair) Get CMS out of the way and watch private school kids come back and scores rise dramtically. Lose the downtown burecracy and watch the cream rise !

What issue? CMS is 32.2% White. How do you intend to carve up 45,000 White kids across the County to "achieve integration"?

CMS and Project LIFT did exactly what the Director of this farce of a project DID NOT want; schools predicated upon a zipcode which includes high concentrations of poverty.

A few weeks ago, CMS floated a $1.86 BILLION bond package over 10 years to build 52 new schools yet Project LIFT has 8 schools tied up for the next 5 years. How will building schools affect this project? Will those parents feel like they're being left out of the money grab? Or will we tear down West Charlotte and build a brand, spanking new one to placate them?

The stupidity all around is astounding.

Bogus data, CMS announcing technology spends they can tell you a dollar amount but don't have a clue whether it will work and a small group of Ballantynians who obviously are rich enough but too cheap to put their kids into private school or move.

............SMART..............(South Meck Anal Retentive Tripe)

If Wal Mart can run the largest retail operation in the world from Bentonville, Arkansas, CMS should be able to manage 140,000 kids from downtown Charlotte.

The Problem is, we haven't hired anyone smart or capable enough to do it.

As WC eludes to, to get any control back to suburbanites of the BOE and the BOCC, the suburbs have to come out and vote at twice the rate of the urban voters.

Once that begins to happen, the Observer will start screaming and scaring the NAACP's and Kojo's and they load up the buses and start marching to the voting booths after church and emptying the graveyards.

As WC eludes to, to get any control back to suburbanites of the BOE and the BOCC, the suburbs have to come out and vote at twice the rate of the urban voters.

Once that begins to happen, the Observer will start screaming and scaring the NAACP's and Kojo's and they load up the buses and start marching to the voting booths after church and emptying the graveyards.

Bolyn, I have already pushed a little about an independent auditor of LIFT data and they have said they will not cooperate. They are "hiring" their own minority analyzers.

I am wondering if we can get a state law passed that if a school system engages a private organization like this that the state must have access to all data and information along the way. Since CMS has "hired" 3 of these people and they ar enow on state payroll, even ignoring the fact LIFT is reimursing, seems the state taxpayers have some rights to full disclosure of what "experiments" and "petri dished" are now involved. It does seem CMS and taxpayers are goingf to have some additional expenses for utilities, buses, etc. I am not sure how they are going to "supplement" teacher's pay other than "blackballing" a teacher who does not want to "donate" an extra 20 hours a week to work.

2:39, you either believe in equal opportunity or you don't. This is not the 1960's in these schools no matter how much these people try to convince you otherwise. Go spend a few days in each type of school and get the teachers to talk to you honestly, probably away from school.

CMS already "spokes" the neighborhood across the street from Calvary Church on highway 51 to Myers Park H.S. I suppose we could divide the system into quarters and spoke every school in the same manner. What about split-feeds? How would CMS spoke split- feeds? Is it possible to spoke Myers Park?

Smart is how can I say it a little dumb. One of their other issues is lack of support by the city / county for gated communities? yeah I read that in one of their announcements. They also wanted to not just leave Charlotte but spoke about becoming a part of South Carolina?

How would students be assigned to schools within spokes? Would all spokes have the same student assignment plan? Or, would each school board within spokes dictate their own assignment plan? Would each spoke have it's own school board?

I'm all in favor of Ballantyne becoming part of South Carolina which might help dig the Palmetto state out of second to last place in student achievement. Plus, I like the idea of all them super smart kids with parents from New York going to S.C. state colleges which might free up some space at Chapel Hill.

4 independent school systems competing to do the most effective and efficient job seems like the best chance of success for all. Ideally we'd have even more "local" systems, but I just do not see that having a snowballs chance.

Back in 2005 the CMS Task Force proposed dividing CMS into four to six districts (still part of CMS), each district having as much autonomy as possible. Several local activists went after the task force with quite a bit of rancor for making this proposal and demanded to "see the maps" (there were no "maps", just the proposal to try to provide more local control). I think Dr. Gorman's districts were based on the above suggestion. And I do believe he intended for them to be much more autonomous than they turned out to be. But he found himself battling the diversity first crowd from the get go.

A self-indulgent digression for die-hard readers: This post, which is already well over 4,000 page views, has pushed the Your Schools all-time views past the 500,000 mark. Woo hoo! Thanks for reading, everybody!

Seems like the conversation has gotten off track from too many tax dollars staying Uptown (versus being dispersed to the outlying areas like south Charlotte) to a conversation about CMS. I am not sure what CMS has to do with it. CMS is one of the worst school systems in the United States and I don't think it has anything to do with taxes. It has to do with colossal mismanagement.

I am readin a book that syas that poverty can be overcomed by students through new methods of teaching. It cost no money. Maybe administration should go to professional development that enhance the brain's ability to learn. It's cost effective because teachers in urban schools do not need extra pay. They follow research methods and direct instruction through programs that are recognized by the educational theorists and practioners.

'Gorman promised promised to make the district more responsive and less Charlotte-centric..."

Well, he either failed at that or he flat out lied and never had intentions of seeing that it happened. I prefer the latter explanation, since keeping the district Charlotte-centric was absolutely necessary to his personal advancement in private industry, where we taxpayers continue to pay his overinflated salary and bonuses since public schools are that company's customers.

Then where's all that money the Feds, State and County get from me they claim goes towards education?

FYI:

Where does the money come from?

Little of CMS’ funding is discretionary. In 2010-2011, 26 percent of the school system’stotal annual budget came from the county; 55 percent came from the state; 16 percentcame from federal sources; and three percent from other sources and special revenue.It should be noted that federal funds are restricted to certain student populations, suchas special education services.

6:55, how many more techniques do you want them to try that they have not over the last 10 years? That is part of the problem. They catch on a new fad and never get anywhere before they see no results and move on to the next. Like teaching phonics or teaching whole word.

Sorry but the trouble is how the children are (not)raised, how little the parents interact to enforce the value of education, discipline, respect, etc. (why when government will be there to take care of you), and lastly do no reading or homework once they get home and just roam the streets and do whatever they want to do.

Anonymous at 1:02 p.m. You should take a look at Dallas and Tarrant Anonymous at 1:02. You ahould take a look at Dallas and Tarrant counties in Texas. Both have numerous independent school districts within their county boundaries and even within the incorporated cities of Ft. Worth and Dallas. Just recently, three very blue collar suburban school districts in Dallas County were named as districts getting the most bang for the buck (ROI), spending about $6,000 per student. The Dallas Independent School District, which, in addition to the high poverty areas, contains North Dallas and Preston Hollow (some of the area's most exclusive housing) was waaaaaay down the list of ROI. Does this sound familiar?

And, as for the school districts in Dallas and Tarrant counties: All have taxing authority, and the justice department has never moved to break them up or make them consolidate with Dallas or Fort Worth. There is no busing to speak of in these suburban districts; it is all neighborhood schools.

ATTENTION: Anonymous at 2:39. The only reason the schools the South Charlotte kids are assigned to are among the best in the state and county is because the PARENTS of the South Charlotte kids, (and they are of every race and ethnic group)are among the SMARTEST, MOST INDUSTRIOUS, MOST SELF SACRIFICING and MOST EDUCATED people in the state and they pass along those values to their children. It is certainly not because CMS provides them with equal resources or treats them fairly. The same applies to those of us in Davidson, Cornelius, and Huntersville and our schools. All of the credit belongs to the parents. NONE of the credit belongs to The Mess that is CMS, of which I would guess you are a part.

1. We don't have a teachers union in North Carolina. The closest you could call it is an assoc. of educators. It has no real power other than to try and lobby and get a teacher extra insurance should one of the sweet darlings try to get you fired or some of the unsavory characters who hide in the system. I am not for a Union. 2. There is money being spent on prof. dev. and some of these new teaching methods. They might work, however nothing works better than actually having a parental presence promoting positive behavior and education in the home.3. If you ask many of the students and families at some of these schools they feel the suburban schools are still given more money and opportunity. This is simply not true we spend roughly twice as much per pupil at low income schools.4. But a real problem we have is ourselves. Anyone who tries to propose anything different that may or may not work automatically gets attacked by some group. Believe it or not we are not a terrible system, we tend to only let the bad get into the paper. And now that our school board has become another political entity in our community it will be worse.

It is funny how the world turns.At one time the best golfer in the world was black and the best rapper white. Think about how in the 60's the minority schools had very little money and books.The Brown vs. Board of Education (SC schools were combined into this) ruling began the end of this inequity.

Now 50 years latter we have the minority in CMS,which is white students,receiving this same shameful inequity. All the money that has been spent show no measureable results. Damn the political correctness. Where is the return on investment?

7:18. Interesting points about Dallas. The problem is Charlotte isn't Dallas. We live in a city where people still remember segregated lunch counters, segregated hospitals, segregated bathrooms, segregated transportation, segregated drinking fountains, a eugenics program that primarily targeted low income blacks, and a segregated school system. Did I mention the authentic KKK robe I viewed at the New Museum of the New South in Charlotte some years ago? Carving out a mostly white and upper middle class school district in Ballantyne will never fly in Charlotte. That dog don't hunt. As far as creating more maps, CMS has a plethora to chose from over many decades that didn't solve much. "decentralized" school zones which was Dr. Gorman's platform when he was hired was a bust.

Pay attention kids. Our current school board is comprised of four African-Americans, two Reverends, six Democrats, two Republicans and one Independent. The day this entity agrees to abdicate power to appease some unhappy suburbanites pigs will most certainly fly. Again, that dog don't hunt.

The only way to change entrenched school board policies is to change the way school board members are elected. This would require redrawing voting districts and actually having people who live in neighborhoods that are currently located in District 6 vote. Or, we can go back to having every school board member elected at-large which still isn't likely to produce the desired outcome of breaking CMS into smaller districts. Just my moo for the day.

Does it ever occur to members of the Observer editorial board that they have helped create the anger in this community? In today's editorial they continue their song and dance of years past, by saying "Studies show U.S. public schools are now more racially segregated than they were in the 1960s. Many of those high-minority, high-poverty schools are under-resourced to meet student needs."

It serves no purpose to throw this tidbit out here, unless they add a caveat that this is certainly not the case for funding and resources in Charlotte--which of course they did not do. Unfortunately, many of the old guard in Charlotte continue to believe that suburban schools are getting it all because that's what the storyline has been for so many years.

I agree with your comments on funding and per pupil spending. There is no question high minority, low income schools receive more funding than their counterparts.

As I said in an earlier comment, just between Project LIFT and Bright Beginnings, those 10,000 students over the next 5 years will have $160,000,000 MILLION dollars thrown at them. That doesn't count Title I, free this and free that plus other state, local and federal dollars.

Notice since Project LIFT plans to spend money putting technology IN THE HOMES of many families of the 8 schools chosen, that CMS all of a sudden is changing its tune on allowing personal electronic devices at school?

What others need to understand is that Project LIFT is sucking CMS into areas they don't need to be involved in.

They eventually want to replicate this district wide. Who will pay for it?Here we are 40 years later with liberals crying about segregation. Busing failed miserably and people could not be forced to live where they did not want to live or forced to put their kids into schools government told them they had to attend.

Liberals and the Observer never want to discuss why the County is almost 60% White but the schools are only a little over 32% White.

Yet we have groups that keep hammering the same, lame 40 year old talking points about minorities versus their dwindling in number White counterparts and what they aren't getting.

CMS needs to get in the business of educating all K-12 students to their ability, spend the money where needed to help those who truly need the remedial help and get out of bed with social engineers.

Educate ALL children the same.

Put all of the pieces in place; good teachers, technology and other infrastructure and then if kids don't get it, they just don't get and move on.

It's time to eliminate excuses.

Get tough and tell parents this is the dawn of a new day. Even though you may come from an environment of poverty as defined by the government or you don't have but an 8th grade education yourself, those are no excuses as to why your child can't learn and have the manners and respect to come to school and be productive.

There are groups like Swann and the NAACP who will not allow CMS to be carved up.

Carving up CMS is will NOT be effient. It might make some people feel better but it will be a waste of time and money.

When you have buckets of money coming from multiple sources and those sources are primarily predicated on school lunch numbers, there will be disagreements as to how you fund each carved out piece of CMS.

Those groups who I am sure would oppose any breakup of CMS will argue those points.

What do you do with magnets? Do you continue to use them as a means of intergating schools?

A school system is either a dual system, which is segregated, or unitary, which is desegregated.

Six of the areas analyzed for Unitary Status, called the Green factors, were established in the 1968 Supreme Court case of Green vs. Country School Board of New Kent County, Virginia.

The Green case held that a school district has achieved Unitary Status when it is devoid of racial discrimination in regards to six areas: faculty, staff, transportation, extracurricular activities, facilities, and pupil assignment. A seventh area, quality of education, was later recognized by the Supreme Court in Freeman vs. Pitts (1992).

Any major changes in school vboundaries and funding would most certainly trigger scrutiny from many groups.

My question to you is, how would you carve up CMS in a way everyone would be happy and pass judicial muster?

This is the last paragraph from a story in American Spectator last year titled Meet The Suburban Parents...

...Suburban parents are unlikely to ever give up their luxuriously appointed classrooms and handsome athletic fields, but, as Upton Sinclair discovered almost a century ago, they will be the first to remedy a clear demonstration of local dysfunction, especially when coupled with options for improvement. If any force has the potential to reform the traditional public school, it is the righteous indignation of a rudely awakened upper-middle class.

Unfortunately folks from Missouri brought us the sorry spectacle of the Kansas City School District (Kansas City, MO). Millions upon millions spent on the system (taken over by the state) and absolutely nothing to show for it.

First, lack of data supporting the effectiveness of CIS is not proof that CIS does NOT work or that it's only a "feel good" program. It simply means the jury is out. Not that I'm defending the relationship between CMS & CIS. (See below.)

Secondly, let me remind all suburbanites criticizing funding for high-poverty schools that many of the decision-makers for the funding and partnerships are your fellow suburbanites. Unfortunately, these already disadvantaged children in the West corridor are being used as pawns in the political pandering of both CMS and CIS.